The Problem of Evil - Common Sense Atheism

50 Philosophical Failure
mere agnostics. They are, so to speak, neutral agnostics. When I was
using a debate about nominalism and realism as my example of an ideal
debate, I said the following about the audience : ‘‘they... stand to the
question whether there are universals as you, no doubt, stand to the
question whether the number of Douglas firs in Canada is odd or even.’’
This sort of neutrality is no consequence of agnosticism simpliciter. I
am an agnostic in respect of the question whether there are intelligent
non-human beings inhabiting a planet within, say, 10,000 light-years of
the Earth. That is, I do not believe that such beings exist, and I do not
believe that no such beings exist. But here is a belief I do have: that the
existence of such beings is vastly improbable. (If I were a bookie, and
if there were some way to settle the bet, I’d be willing to give anyone
who wanted to bet that there were such beings just about any odds I
needed to give him to get him to place his bet with me and not some
rival bookie.) There is no inconsistency in saying both that one does
not believe (does not have the belief) that p and that one regards p as
very, very probable, although the unfortunate currency of the idea of
‘‘degrees of belief’’ has caused some confusion on this point. After all,
the proposition that Jill is in Budapest today and the proposition that it’s
highly probable that Jill is in Budapest today are distinct propositions,
neither of which entails the other, and it is possible to accept the latter
without accepting the former. I would suppose that most real agnostics,
most actual people who do profess and call themselves agnostics, are not
neutral agnostics. Most agnostics I have discussed these matters with
think that it’s pretty improbable that there’s a God. Their relation to
the proposition that God exists is very much like my relation to the
proposition that there are intelligent non-human beings inhabiting some
planet within 10,000 light-years of the Earth. And this consideration
suggests a possible objection to my definition of philosophical success.
Call those agnostics who think that it’s very improbable that there is
aGodweighted agnostics. An argument for the non-existence of God,
the argument from evil for example, might be a failure by my criterion
because it lacked the power to transform ideal (and hence neutral)
agnostics into atheists. But it might, consistently with that, have the
power to transform neutral agnostics into weighted agnostics. If it does,
isn’titratherhardonittocallitafailure?Inresponse,Iwillsayonlythat
if you want to revise the definition to take account of this, I don’t object.
In practice, it will make no real difference. I’m going to try to convince
you that the argument from evil has not got the power to transform
ideal (and hence neutral) agnostics into atheists. But I should be willing